Motivation Doesn’t Have To Be Hard!

Motivation doesn’t have to be hard, but the truth of the matter most of the time IT IS!

The amount of distractions that get in your way when you set out to do something can sometimes seam ridiculously high.

Let’s say you need to clean up your office, or any other task you need to do…. Here comes a distraction in the form of… but I don’t really “feel” like doing it right now. So what do you do? You procrastinate, you put it off for another time… any other time but right now. Next course of action… let’s see how I can satisfy those feelings… a little TV… or maybe let’s see whats on Facebook… maybe I’ll just catch a few Zzzzzs. The result is hours of wasted time with very little to show for it. At some point you’ll have to ask yourself what the heck are those feelings that derail me so easily, and where are they coming from? What makes me give into them time and time again? Am I such an undisciplined lazy wimp that I just don’t have what it takes to get things done.

Well… motivation doesn’t have to be hard… at least not always. When motivation is the hardest is usually in the beginning stages, This is the stage when momentum doesn’t exist “yet”. I use the word “yet” because there comes a time when your momentum can becomes so strong that it will literally smash through anything in it’s way. I’ll share an analogy in a few moments, but first it’s important to get a grip on “the why” of the problem. Why is motivation so hard?

Larry Hendricks give some insight on the subject in a really good article titled “Motivation is Hard; Failure is Easy.” He states:

“If motivation was easy, we’d all be successful.” Think about a world where everyone is highly motivated toward success, achieving their goals on a regular basis. No procrastinators, no slackers, no goof-offs … Now that we’re all back to reality, let’s look at why motivation is so hard and failure is so easy.”

He list 10 reasons why we fail and a few great antidotes to combat them here.

Now for the analogy.

Picture a jet plane getting ready to take off to a destination. the pilots get their flight instructions, they map out their plans, take a look at the weather forecast to anticipate any problems, then after checking systems and whatever else they do, they start taxing out to the runway. If you notice, the jet engines are on, but they are not of full power. Once the plane gets to the top of the strip, and is pointed down the runway, the engines start to rev up. It’s not a mild rev but a hard full throttle rev. That plane is going to need all the power it has to achieve lift off. So the jet plane is now screaming down the runway, picking up speed as it goes until finally the wheels lift off from the ground. At this point the engines don’t let up. They are still screaming, and continues until the plane reaches a certain altitude where the pilot can ease off the throttle and turn her focus to adjusting the direction of the plane towards it’s destination taking full advantage of the momentum that was gained during the period of full throttle.

So it is with motivation.

Motivation doesn’t have to be hard…. In the beginning stages yes it is, you have to give it everything you’ve got to get off the ground, however when you reach coasting altitude, and the momentum kicks in, it takes a lot less effort to simple tweak the direction to achieve your goals.

Try a few of the antidotes in the article link and let me know how it works for you.